GNU Diffutils 2.8 is available

From:

Paul Eggert

Subject:

GNU Diffutils 2.8 is available

Date:

Mon, 25 Mar 2002 11:12:10 -0800 (PST)

GNU Diffutils 2.8 is now available by anonymous FTP from:
ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/diffutils/diffutils-2.8.tar.gz
and from mirrors worldwide -- see <http://www.gnu.org/order/ftp.html>.
The SHA-1 checksum, as computed by GNU sha1sum, is:
c9cb7e627096fe5c33dbbc90fbb2a56fd263e7e0 diffutils-2.8.tar.gz
GNU Diffutils contains the `cmp', `diff', `diff3', and `sdiff'
utilities for comparing files. It also documents how to use GNU
`patch' (which is part of a separate distribution). Please see
<http://www.gnu.org/software/diffutils/> for more information.
GNU Diffutils wouldn't be possible without contributions from many
people. For this release I'd like in particular to thank Bruno Haible
for help with internationalized messages, and Eli Zaretskii for help
with ports to non-GNU platforms. Thanks also go to Jim Meyering and
Richard Stallman for their continued encouragement to get a new
version out the door.
Please email bugs or suggestions to <address@hidden>.
Here are user-visible changes in version 2.8:
* cmp and diff now conform to POSIX 1003.1-2001 (IEEE Std 1003.1-2001)
if the underlying system conforms to POSIX and if the _POSIX2_VERSION
environment variable is set to 200112. Conformance removes support
for `diff -NUM', where NUM is a number. Use -C NUM or -U NUM instead.
* cmp now supports trailing operands SKIP1 and SKIP2, like BSD cmp.
* cmp -i or --ignore-initial now accepts SKIP1:SKIP2 option value.
* New cmp option: -n or --bytes.
* cmp's old -c or --print-chars option has been renamed;
use -b or --print-bytes instead.
* cmp now outputs "byte" rather than "char" outside the POSIX locale.
* cmp -l's index column width now adjusts to fit larger (or smaller) files.
* cmp -l -s and cmp -s -l are not allowed. Use cmp -s or cmp -l instead.
* diff uses ISO 8601 style time stamps for output times (e.g. "2001-11-23
16:44:36.875702460 -0800") unless in the C or POSIX locale and the
-c style is specified.
* diff's -I and -F options use the regexp syntax of grep, not of Emacs.
* diff now accepts multiple context arguments, and uses their maximum value.
* New diff and sdiff options:
-E --ignore-tab-expansion
--strip-trailing-cr
* New diff options:
--from-file=FILE, --to-file=FILE
--ignore-file-name-case
--no-ignore-file-name-case
* New diff3 and sdiff option:
--diff-program=PROGRAM
* The following diff options are still accepted but are no longer documented.
They may be withdrawn in future releases.
-h (omit; it has no effect)
-H (use --speed-large-files instead)
-L (use --label instead)
-P (use --unidirectional-new-file instead)
--inhibit-hunk-merge (omit; it has no effect)
* Recursive diffs now sort file names according to the LC_COLLATE locale
category if possible, instead of using native byte comparison.
* Diff printf specs can now use the "0" and "'" flags.
* The new sdiff interactive command `ed' precedes each version with a header.
* On 64-bit hosts, files larger than 2 GB can be compared.
* Some internationalization support has been added, but multibyte locales
are still not completely supported yet.
* Some diagnostics have been reworded slightly for consistency.
Also, `diff -D FOO' now outputs `/* ! FOO */' instead of `/* not FOO */'.
* The manual is now distributed according to the terms of the GNU Free
Documentation License <http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html>.
* The `patch' part of the manual now describes `patch' version 2.5.4.
* Man pages are now distributed and installed.
* There is support for DJGPP; see the 'ms' subdirectory and the files
m4/dos.m4 and */setmode.*.